Hey, how about a video game depicting the killing of the people who run Joystiq? Bet they'd be real interested in doing something about a certain game then. Maybe then they'd feel how cops and women feel about GTA. Oh, but that would require some actual thought, and I forgot: You're all gamers!
--Jack Thompson
» Jack Thompson - all quotes »
Lets say you make a kid feel angry; he is going to act out what he has spent hundreds of hours doing. He has spent hundreds of hours hurting people in virtual reality. And the thing that is doubly troubling now is the graphics are so crisp and so virtually real that the brain can literally not differentiate between real violence and virtual violence, I'm a lawyer who for 20 years did medically related work. As a citizen, I entered the violent video game arena with the Paducah, Ky., shootings,
I had represented abused women and children, and that album ("As Nasty as They Wanna Be") was totally inappropriate for minors,
Killing is such an incredibly dramatic thing to do. But I quickly became disabused of that skepticism. Now it's a whole body of thought that is very, very troubling. And we are seeing these instances with incredible frequency. Here we had one in Kansas and a day later in Alaska, Playing the games desensitizes the person to the act of killing, because there is no guilt. It's a game. You are winning the game, and it's a pleasurable thing. You can get a gamer's high killing people. And there's no need to feel guilty about it -- that's how you win the game. In the Civil War, for example, soldiers were found dead on the battle field with loaded muskets. It wasn't because the guns were malfunctioning. The soldiers were young men who had been trained by their parents to go hunting with guns -- not use them to kill others. And they couldn't do it, even in the face of hostile fire. So time and again these men would load their guns, raise them and pretend to fire. Those soldiers had not been trained to overcome their inhibition to kill, If somebody else's kid plays a video game and puts my kid in harm's way in school or someplace else, I have a legitimate interest in that, The Grand Theft Auto games immerse you in a lonely world of violence, cheap sex, and pixelated nihilism, Most experts say it takes more than 100 hours to complete all of GTA: San Andreas just once.
It shows you how to -- by bullying -- take over your school. You punch people; you hit them with sling shots; you dunk their heads in dirty toilets. There's white-on-black crime in the game. You bludgeon teachers and classmates with bats. It's absolutely nuts. This is the most knuckle-headed thing I think any entertainment entity in the history of American entertainment has ever done. The word 'Columbine' means something. Everybody viscerally understands that you don't want to teach kids to bully one another. Suspects in the Kansas and Alaska incidents have bullying components just as Columbine's Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris did. Then you give them a simulator on how to exact their revenge and settle scores? It's crazy.Jack Thompson
You Pixelante Knuckleheads (Sorry to Be Redundant) Missed Spike's Point The point Spike is making in the movie and with his comments about the movie's scene with the violent game is that the games are too violent, and they are emblematic of the irresponsibility of the video game industry. I am not at all surprised that gamers wouldn't get it; in fact, Spike Lee knows you wouldn't get it, as indicated by his belief that someone will copy the game scene, which is a criticism of the industry. Which, of course, makes his point exquisitely. It is fascinating, is it not, that the people in this country who have deserved reputations are real artists, real professionals, all decry the recklessness of the entertainment industry and the divorce between art and sanity that prevails in some quarters. Here at GP is one of them. God bless Spike Lee. He gets it. You at GP don't. Hooah. Jack Thompson
Jack Thompson
Wow, are you confused. The man who was voted Video Game Co-Person of the Year, along with Paul Eibeler, for 2005 is testifying before a state legislature on behalf of a constitutional video game bill, and that is not news at a site supposedly dedicated to covering governmental efforts against the video game industry? What illegal substance are you on, bucko?
Jack Thompson
Video games are sexy. People need to be aware that GNU/Linux is more than just something to drive your webservers... A lot of people (myself included) feel that video games are a major factor in getting GNU/Linux to the masses. I can't count the number of people that have said, "Thanks for porting [GAME X]! It was the only reason I kept a Windows partition around!"
Ryan C. Gordon
Jack Thompson will testify this coming Wednesday, March 15, before the Delaware legislature on behalf of a video game bill he helped draft. Game Politics knew about this days ago. Why did Dennis McCauley not report it? Surely video game enthusiasts are not censoring the news in defense of the First Amendment, now are they? Not our Dennis!
Jack Thompson
Thompson, Jack
Thompson, John Sparrow
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